Walgreens Improves Server Uptime by More Than 50 Percent and Saves Millions in IT Costs with SUSE Linux Enterprise Server
Nation's largest drugstore chain migrates from UNIX to Linux to increase reliability, reduce cost and accelerate new store setup

With more than 7,500 stores nationwide and a sizeable IT infrastructure, Walgreens sought a more flexible, scalable and cost-effective platform to support its burgeoning growth. Previously, the company ran many of its business-critical applications on a UNIX operating system that was reaching end of life. Walgreens recognized an upgrade would have required a substantial investment, so it decided to move to a virtualized Linux-based environment to speed server deployments and lower total cost of ownership. After evaluating several platforms, Walgreens selected SUSE Linux Enterprise Server based on the operating system's lower support costs and superior performance, reliability and built-in virtualization capabilities.

Walgreens is now running its proprietary pharmacy application, as well as certain third-party applications, in a virtualized SUSE Linux Enterprise Server environment on a mix of IBM* and HP servers. The virtualization capabilities of SUSE Linux Enterprise Server enable Walgreens to consolidate servers and add new ones as needed.

In addition, by migrating business-critical applications from UNIX to SUSE Linux Enterprise Server, Walgreens has reduced the time required to set up new stores and can now build multiple servers at once, decreasing server setup time by more than 50 percent. Using proprietary scripting, along with YaST®, the installation, configuration and systems management tool included in SUSE Linux Enterprise Server, Walgreens now has a cleaner, more streamlined process for rolling out IT systems in new stores.

About SUSE Linux Enterprise

The next-generation platform for the open enterprise, SUSE Linux Enterprise is the best-engineered and most interoperable platform for mission-critical computing, from the desktop to the data center. For more information on SUSE Linux Enterprise offerings from Novell, visit www.novell.com/linux. For more on how customers around the globe are leveraging Novell® solutions, visit www.novell.com/success.

About Novell

Novell, Inc. (Nasdaq: NOVL), a leader in intelligent workload management, helps organizations securely deliver and manage computing services across physical, virtual and cloud computing environments. We help customers reduce the cost, complexity and risk associated with their IT systems through our solutions for identity and security, systems management, collaboration and Linux-based operating platforms. With our infrastructure software and ecosystem of partnerships, Novell integrates mixed IT environments, allowing people and technology to work as one. For more information, visit www.novell.com.

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